Craig told Belfast Live: "I remember going for a ball and next thing I remember is being rushed from the Ulster Hospital up to the Royal.

"When I landed I had swallowed my tongue and was face down. My team-mates have told me they thought I was dead. No one would touch me because they were worried I had a broken neck.

"Jamie decided to haul me over and push my head back and get me breathing.

"At the moment I have lost all feeling down my right-hand side and I don't know if moving me caused me any damage but if someone hadn't taken the decision to move me I wouldn't be here today.

Craig with Niall Horan in Status Nightclub (Photo: Facebook)

"I don't know if there are rules but I think the league should impose a rule that every team should have at least one nominated and qualified first aider because it showed how quickly someone could lose their life.

"I also want to thank everyone who has got in touch with me and I am just glad I have lived to tell the tale.

"Waking up with all these mails and messages just makes me feel stronger to get through this.

"I would like to say a massive thank you to Jamie Bryson and David Nannery for literally saving my life.

"I've never been so grateful to have people like them beside me especially when I needed them most.

"Sometimes decisions have to be made and by God they made the right one and got me breathing again.

"Thank you so much, I know me and my family are really grateful."

Jamie Bryson revealed: "By the time I had run from the dugout to the goal-mouth another of my players passed me, head in hands, saying, 'he is dead'.

"We managed to get his tongue out and get him breathing again until the ambulance came, he was unconscious for 20 minutes.

"We had to take the decision to roll him over and at the time we thought his neck was broken but I suppose a permanent broken neck was a lot better than him dying in front of us.

"He has severed the main nerves in his neck and lost feeling down the right-hand side of his body. It isn't known if it will come back again but we are hopeful."

He added: "It was the most awful day of football I have ever experienced. Genuinely thought our big mate Craig had gone.

"It was the most horrendous moments ever holding his head and tongue waiting on an ambulance to arrive.

"Thankfully Craig started to regain consciousness when the ambulance crew arrived and is now in hospital."